BLOG — Spring cleaning for the body

Spring is purification time at our house, when, much like cleaning out the closets, we do a thorough wringing of our guts. It’s not the funnest 21 days of the year, but it’s an opportunity to feel warm and fuzzy about my liver, my kidneys, and the 28 feet of intestines that for most of the year I don’t acknowledge I have. I think of my hair, which is dead, way more than I think of my hardworking innards, and once a year I need to right the injustice.

The Purification Program created by Standard Process vitamin company is a three-week tortur…I mean diet designed to detoxify the body by consuming only vegetables and fruit. The regimen includes a protein powder for fruit shakes eaten twice a day, and whole food supplements and fibers designed to metabolize toxins, clean out the intestinal lining and build back essential amino acids in the body. The main rules are: all fruit and almost all veggies (except potatoes) are allowed, as long as you eat twice as many veggies as fruit and keep most of the veggies raw. A small amount of olive, flax, grapeseed and coconut oil can be used each day, and you can have a cup of lentils or brown rice each day too.

Being that cheese is my favorite food in the world, and chocolate isn’t far behind, and neither of these foods has even an ingredient that is allowed on this diet, this month is going to be difficult. On Sunday, day one, Kirk felt tired and depressed. I felt disinterested and thought about shaving my head to at least try to get some credit for acting like a monk.

Day 1: The fruit shakes tastes pretty good with frozen raspberries, blueberries, a little banana for sweetness, and fresh grapefruit juice.

Day 2: I’m sick of fruit shakes.

Day 3: Avocado and cherry tomatoes with lemon tarragon vinaigrette makes a salad a meal! I have also never tasted roasted beets and acorn squash so clearly. This heart-shaped slate-colored squash is sweet and buttery, and did you know that beet skins are salty?

Day 4: French lentils simmered with garlic and lemon juice and eaten with a spoonful of hot salsa and green onions. The flavors rock! Okay I cheated a bit with the salsa, which is overcooked, but I’m too smitten to turn back now. It’s on the menu for the duration.

This regimen is actually tasty enough to stay on for another 16 days — but no more! After three weeks our blood and organs should be cleaner and leaner, and we can go back to enjoying a more gluttonous life of cheese, wine, coffee, white bread and chocolate again…until next year.